Colo. official: ‘Preparing for the worst’ in floods

Lafayette Fire Chief Gerry Morrell tells TODAY that they are expecting even more rainfall today and recounts a heroic attempt to save a man’s life.

Regional forecasts

This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.

>>we want to get more on the remarkable rescue that you mentioned. emergency crews pulling ayman trapped in a car out of raging flood waters. he's the
fire chief
of lafayette colorado and was at the scene. he joins us now. chief, good morning to you.

>>good morning.

>>i want to ask you about the rescue but first tell me what conditions are now. what are you expecting to face today?

>>well, we're expecting more rain today. it's coming in waves. it seems to clear up a little bit and then rain again. so we really are just preparing for the worst. the rising flood waters throughout the whole region.

>>has it been difficult to try to evacuate people given that so many roads are washed out?

>>yes, it's been extremely difficult to get people motivated, i guess, is the biggest thing, to move and get out of harm's way.

>>as we saw in the piece a few moments ago you were part of an incredible rescue. you shot video of it as it was unfolding on your own phone. can you tell me about what happened?

>>well, about 5:00 in the morning, somewhere around there, we got a call for an accident with injury. we got to the scene. we found three cars at the bottom of a revene. there should have been a road there but it was gone and all three cars ended up in there, if you will. one person was self-evacuated and we had to perform water rescue to get people out.

>>it's an incredible scene. you have a lot to deal with today. we appreciate your time. the lafayette
fire chief
, thank you and good luck to you today.

>>thank you very much.

>>>what are they going to be dealing with today?

>>as the chief elude to it will be on going right into the weekend. we'll show you some of the incredible amounts of rainfall that have fallen. some areas picking up more rainfall in
48 hours
than they get in over a year. denver, 14 .5 inches, boulder more than
12 inches
of rain. it keeps coming in waves i. will continue. it's not going to let up. we have this upper level low with the moisture out of the southwest so it doesn't fall. and flood watches in effect from idaho all the way to western texas. here's what we look for. more rainfall in the next
24 hours
. you can see frall the way up to denver, another 3 to 4 inches of rain. so that is not good news. it's going to continue and unfortunately there's a tropical system that may add more rain to that area starting early next week.